It is frequently necessary to transport medical patients from the site of an accident or injury to a hospital. For example, persons suffering from casualties, trauma, or various medical emergency conditions such as heart attacks, and strokes must be transported quickly to a medical facility. Medical personnel speak of a "golden hour" within which such a medical patient must be transported to a medical facility so that proper medical care can be provided therefor. The survival rate for such medical patients is greatly enhanced if they are transported to the medical facility within that time.
As those skilled in the art will appreciate, it is frequently difficult to transport a patient to a remotely located medical facility in a timely manner, particularly within one hour. It is not unusual for accidents to occur at remote locations. Thus, a substantial amount of time may be required to transport the medical patient to a distant hospital. Also, in battlefield situations it is frequently impossible to transport a casualty immediately. In either instance, the patient may be located hundreds, if not thousands, of miles from the desired hospital, thus necessitating several hours of transport time. As such, it is frequently beneficial to perform various emergency medical procedures at the site of the medical problem, and then to attempt to provide ongoing medical care during transport to a remote hospital. The mortality rate of such transported medical patients is substantially reduced.
It is well-known to use various different medical devices in the field, i.e., at locations remote from a medical facility, so as to enhance a medical patient's chance of survival. For example, it is well-known to use an electrocardiograph (ECG) and a defibrillator upon heart attack victims so as to monitor the condition thereof and so as to provide medical treatment therefor in field.
Typically, the medical patient is placed upon a stretcher and then various different medical devices are used upon the patient, as necessary. During transport the medical devices may either be temporarily disconnected from the patient, or alternatively may be hand carried along therewith by additional personnel. However, disconnection of the medical devices from the patient results in the undesirable disruption of medical monitoring and/or treatment therefor. Hand carrying the medical devices along with the patient requires extra personnel, which may not be available, or for which there may not be adequate room within the transport vehicle.
As such, it is desirable to provide a system for transporting a medical patient wherein the medical devices are carried along with the stretcher. In an attempt to provide such a system for transporting a medical patient while facilitating the continuous use of medical devices thereupon, the Mobile Intensive Care Rescue Facility (MIRF) was developed by the Royal Australian Army Medical Corp. The MIRF is intended to provide sufficient medical equipment to have the capabilities of an intensive care hospital ward. The MIRF is designated so as to facilitate the removal and replacement of the various pieces of medical equipment therefrom for maintenance. The MIRF is specifically designed to accommodate two major roles: the transfer of critically ill people from one point to another, such as from a ward to an x-ray room or from one hospital to another; and the bringing of life support systems quickly to the scene of an accident or other medical emergency.
The MIRF can be configured to include a blood pressure cuff, an invasive blood pressure monitor, a body temperature sensor, a heart rate sensor (finger clip sensor), an oxygen saturation sensor, an exhaled air carbon dioxide sensor, and an electrocardiograph, so as to facilitate medical monitoring of a patient. Further, the MIRF can include a ventilation system, a volumetric infusion pump, a syringe pump, a suction unit, and a defibrillator so as to facilitate medical treatment.
Another contemporary system is the Mobile Intensive Care Unit (MOBI) described in United States Letters Patent No. 4,957,121, issued to Icenogle et al. on Sep. 18, 1990. The MOBI is similar to the MIRF in concept. That is, like the MIRF, the MOBI utilizes off-the-shelf medical devices which are attached to the housing thereof so as to be transportable therewith, thus eliminating disruptions in the medical care provided thereby during transport.
Further examples of such contemporary life support systems include those disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,584,989; 4,352,991; 4,691,397; 3,304,116; and 3,341,246.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,584,989 discloses a life support stretcher bed adapted to accommodate patients in intensive or cardiac care units in hospitals. The life support stretcher bed is broadly adapted for electrical medical devices, medical supplies and features an undercarriage including a support structural, wheels, a patient housing with a mattress, an electrical power source and supports for mounting the medical equipment.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,352,991 teaches a life support system adapted for field use in a vehicle with available power and includes electrically operable life support units, means for supporting the life support units, a patient stretcher, and a DC power source adapted for battery or remote power source.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,691,397 teaches a device for carrying the life supporting devices of a bedridden patient including a table like means for supporting the devices, an IV holder, wheeled transport means and a hospital bed footboard securing means.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,341,246 teaches a hospital stretcher adapted broadly with a litter structure having telescopic post elements and other means for manipulating the patient to various positions.
As those skilled in the art will appreciate, it would further be desirable to monitor the operation of each of the medical devices so as to provide medical personnel with useful information regarding the patient's condition. Medical personnel could then use the results of such monitoring to determine the condition of the patient as well as the treatment which must be provided to the patient.
It is also desirable to locate the controls and indicators associated with each medical device at a common location. Thus, there is no the need for an operator to move about the platform upon which the patient is disposed in order to individually observe a display for each medical device or to individually control each medical device. As such, it is desirable to provide means for monitoring and controlling each of the medical devices from a single location.
The ability to monitor all of the medical devices from a single location has the additional benefit of allowing the operator to observe changes in the display of one or more particular medical devices. The central location observations may substantially affect the patient's treatment by detecting events/conditions which may be missed if the operator is moving about the transportable life support system so as to observe each of the medical device's displays individually. For example, if the displays and indicators for the medical devices were not located together, then while the operator is observing one display, a change in another display may go unnoticed. If the change in the other display is transient in nature, then critical medical treatment may not be administered. Even if the change in the other display remains long enough for the operator to observe once the operator finally moves into a position to observe that display, then medical treatment has been delayed and may possibly be too late to provide the desired care.
It is further desirable to not only position the displays and indicators of the medical devices at a common location, but to do so in a manner which maintains integrity of prior governmental clearance of the medical devices. As those skilled in the art will appreciate, obtaining governmental clearance can be a time consuming and costly procedure. Thus, it would be preferable to utilize previously FDA cleared medical devices in a manner which does not invalidate their prior pedigree and clearance.
It is further desirable to position the controls and indicators of the medical devices in a manner which enhances thermal compatibility with the transportable life support system. More particularly, it is desirable to position the controls, data processors, and indicators such that cooling air passes thereabout before passing through the platform such that cooling of heat sensitive devices of the controls, processors, and displays is enhanced.
In a similar manner, it is desirable to position the controls, processors and displays in a manner which mitigates electromagnetic interference among components of the transportable life support system.
It is further desirable to attach the controls and indicators to the transportable life support system in a manner which facilitates easy removal and replacement thereof, and which substantially replicates the mounting provisions of the original equipment installations. It is also desirable to locate the controls and displays in a common location in an orientation relative to each other so as to optimize their access and functionality for particular medical procedures. The control and display subsystem of the present invention interfaces to the medical devices of the transportable life support system in a manner which does not substantially interfere with the operation thereof, thereby attempting to maintain integrity of the prior governmental premarket clearance, such as Food and Drug Administration (FDA) clearance of medical devices in the United States. This integrity is accomplished while repositioning the controls and displays of the individual medical devices subsystem at a common location, rather than having the controls and displays be co-located with the individual medical devices with which they are associated.
Thus, according to the present invention, the transportable life support system can assert adherence to predicate devices' features, safety, and efficacy within its governmental pre-market clearance process, since the individual medical monitoring devices and medical treatment devices thereof have already been cleared and since such prior governmental clearance integrity is asserted to be still valid after integration of the devices into the transportable life support system.